LAUNCHED: The Chenab Valley Power Projects Ltd is taking up three power projects in Kishtwar with a combined generation of 2120 MW at an estimated cost of Rs 15000 crore. The work on the projects is likely to start next year and would be completed in 7 years.
BAILED: A Srinagar court granted the PDP president Mehbooba Mufti bail and exempted her from appearing personally in the defamation suit against her filed by NC leader Ali Mohammad Sagar in 2004.
PROFILED: Police have started profiling released militants in Baramulla, Sopore and Rafiabad areas of north Kashmir. While police said that it was being done to keep a watch over them, Chief Minister Omar Abdullah said that profiling of released militants was being carried out to formulate a rehabilitation policy for them in consultation with the Union Home Ministry.
RESUMED: The cross-LoC trade resumed after remaining suspended for four weeks at Uri and three months at Chakkan-da-Bagh Poonch. While 19 trucks exchanged at Poonch, 39 vehicles crossed sides in Uri- the lowest for any trading day this year.
ANNOUNCED: Chief Minister, Omar Abdullah announced a Task Force for Information Technology sector help its development besides working out a proposal for digitisation of records in Home, Power, R&B and Planning departments.
FIXED: Setting aside an earlier judgement, the Division Bench of High Court has upheld the upper age limit of 28 years for recruitment of police constables saying that Article 37 of J&K CSR is not applicable to such recruitments.
APPOINTED: The government appointed advocate Rafiq Fida and advocate Amolak Singh to the State Human Rights Commission after Governor NN Vohra cleared their names.
ORDERED: The Home Minister has written to I&B Minister Ambika Soni asking her to provide adequate funds for continuance of “news-based psy-war” and other programmes on DD Kashir – Doordarshan’s Kashmiri language channel. A newspaper quoting unnamed sources in the I&B Ministry said Chidambaram’s concerns would be addressed immediately.
SANCTIONED: Centre has sanctioned Rs 3.76 crore to the J&K Milk Producers’ Co-operative Limited (JKMPCL) under centrally sponsored Clean Milk Project to improve quality and production of milk.
EXPECTED: Salman Anees, son of state Congress president Saifudin Soz, is likely to join politics. A graduate of Delhi’s St Stephen’s College, he worked with few companies in USA and India before moving to World Bank in 1995.
DIED: Massive protests rocked the Harduaboora village of Budgam district over the death of a class 10th student, Shabir son of Habibullah Dar, who died after falling into a trench dug by the R&B department.
RECEIVED: The state government has received only one expression of interest from a consultancy for quantifying the losses J&K has suffered due to Indus Water Treaty. Halcrow Consulting India Limited is part of Halcrow Group of UK.
ORDERED: The Division Bench of High Court has upheld the single bench judgment directing the state government to release consequential service benefits to the Director Information Farooq Ahmad Renzu. The court ordered the release of timescale grade benefits from August 21, 1983 in favour of Renzu.
HAUNTED: Bungergund Handwara incident, in which three boys were killed in army firing in 2005, has started to haunt the youth of Trehgam again as the police is hunting for around 200 boys allegedly involved in street protests against these killings and ransacking of government and public property.
ASSURED: Syed Ali Shah Geelani walked into a police station in Srinagar to stand surety for three arrested boys detained for raising “anti-national slogans and creating a law and order situation” in the city. Geelani had to wait for two hours before the SHO returned to the station and asked him to furnish a personal surety bond for the good conduct of the arrested boys in the future.
THREATENED: Former chief minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed’s son-in-law Showkat Sharif, who runs a car dealership in Chennai, has received a threat letter. Dr Rubaiya Sharif and her husband had moved to Chennai more than five years ago.
SIGNED: The government has signed an agreement with US-based Ellicott Dredges for procuring two dredgers for Jhelum conservation at an estimated cost of Rs 12 crore.
DROVE: Omar Abdullah became the first chief minister to drive to north Kashmir’s Bandipora town since1996. His predecessors preferred to fly to the town. Omar returned to Srinagar in a helicopter. “Seems no chief minister has driven to Bandipore in 15 years… No wonder the road was bad as it was,” he tweeted, and promised he “will make sure work starts on it soon”.
HIGH COURT: After the court quashed her detention under PSA twice since August 28, 2010, Dukhtaran-e-Millat leader Asiya Andrabi was rearrested under the same law last week. Initially, she was shifted to Baramulla district jail but the jail lacked separate enclosure for female detainees. She was rushed to Srinagar and kept in the women police station Rambagh. Next day she was driven to the Kot Balwal Jammu on the orders of DC Srinagar. Now the High Court has directed the government to shift her to the Central Jail Srinagar where her husband Ashiq Hussain Fuktoo is detained since 1999. Asiya’s lawyer Mian Abdul Qayoom, who himself came out of the jail after fighting a protracted battle in 1980’s says, that she is not keeping well. But did nobody in the government knew that Baramulla jails lacks space for women!
AKHNOOR : For many years it was a solo effort but now it seems to be taking a joint route. Usha Devi, a Janipur based housewife hired a car and forced its halt on the newly set up Akhnoor bridge. She got her cell phone out, rang up her husband and then jumped into the river. Cab driver informed her husband Sunil, who owns HIIT Computer Centre. He also drove to the same spot in his Scorpio, talked to the driver and then jumped into the river. The mystery is unresolved. A local web portal reported that a newly-wed couple Abdul Majid Peer, 35, and his wife of Punzwa village in Vilgam Handwara, consumed some poisonous substance at their home after they fought over a cell phone (instrument). However, they were immediately rushed to hospital and saved.
SKICC: The convention complex these days is too busy. Apart from official functions, it is hosting many events that somehow draw the youth in. After a counselling camp, it was a comedy theatre festival. It was apparently a DD presentation packaged in the name of J&K Film Makers and Artists Cooperative Ltd. At the inaugural function, the comedy was more in the speeches that guests delivered in English; the actual comedy was almost a tragedy. One of the female Pandit artists, according to organizers, skipped joining mourning of her father in Jammu to keep her date at the stage. Post-comedy, it has been a fashion show. There were estimated 500 men and women watching 25 desi boys on the ramp showcasing formal and casual wear. Thanks Sheikh Imran Bashir but who are Wilson and Royal?
DELHI: Barely seven-month-old, Sadia last week went under a surgeon’s knife. She was operated for Craniosynostosis, a rare disfigured skull condition in which one or more fibrous sutures – the joints between the skull bones -in an infant’s cranium prematurely fuses by ossification (bone tissue formation), thereby changing the growth pattern of the skull. Her skull was growing more sideways and less from front to back which is not the normal skull development. Daughter of Basharat, a Tangmarg resident who is employed in the Radio Kashmir, the operation took place at Batra hospital. Dr Parvez Khan who led the seven hour long surgery says Sadia will now be able to lead a normal life.
SEMTHAN PASS: J&K has 22 districts and 10 of them could be covered in 24 hours. That was proved by the second Mughal Rally, a motor sports event that was attended by 40 motorists. After being flagged off in Srinagar, they crossed Pir Pachal through Shopian, reached Poonch and stayed at Hari Niwas hotel in Jammu for the night. Next day they took Udhampur-Reasi trek to reach Kishtwar and crossed Simthan Pass to dine in Srinagar. Gaurav Chiripaul, Harkaran Singh and Karan Jung were the three top position holders who bagged the million bucks prize for the 750-kms race. For the first time, Khyber Industries has sent a local motorist Taufeeq Mughal to join the race. Attraction of the race was a Delhi motorist Divya Miglani, the only female participant. A motor adventuress since 2005, she attended the competition in J&K for second time.
KULLU: It was a providential escape for Omar Abdullah family when his wife took their two sons for rafting in Beas at Bhuntar, a Kullu outskirt. The raft overturned but the three – Payal, Zahir and Zamir, wearing life jackets were rescued. Back home two women staffers of Sindh Valley Education Institute, Kangan – Naseema and Mumtaz – were not as fortunate as they lost their lives in Sindh river at Sonamarg when their raft hit a boulder and turned turtle.
